


This Phantom Skin It’s Weird To Live In

by enbyglowstick



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Gen, Non-Binary Vanya Hargreeves, Trans Vanya Hargreeves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:42:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28194894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enbyglowstick/pseuds/enbyglowstick
Summary: A person’s sex is easy to figure out. Once a baby is born they are either Male, Female or Intersex. Gender, on the other hand, is a difficult journey of self-discovery. This is the journey of Number Seven’s gender identity.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19





	This Phantom Skin It’s Weird To Live In

**Author's Note:**

> This has been sitting in my drafts since August and, in celebration of Elliot Page coming out, I decided to rewrite it because why not. Also, I’m a non-binary person that uses He/They pronouns so that is what I’m writing Vanya as.
> 
> Also, the title is from Dysphoria by Cavetown

The first time Number Seven questioned their gender was when they were seven. It was the first time the idea of gender had been taught to the siblings, as Number Four wore Number Three’s skirt and, in their father’s words, ‘Boys wear trousers and girls wear skirts, now take off that nonsense’. But, Number Seven did not want to wear a skirt. Were they a boy?

That night, Seven stood in front of their mirror. Hair covered their shoulders and eyes, however, it did not look like them. The person in the mirror was unrecognisable to Seven. Everything was wrong; they weren’t meant to have long hair, they weren’t meant to wear a skirt, they weren’t meant to be called she, and they especially weren’t meant to be a girl. 

At that age, one isn’t told about the existence of people who do not identify as the gender they were born as. This can be damaging to a child as it leaves them in a state of confusion, which they bury deep down, until one day everything makes sense. Number Seven’s thoughts of this were buried and later brought up at the age of twelve. 

At twelve years old, Number Seven was already going through puberty. Breasts had begun to form, but not fully developed yet, and their body had begun to change in ways that they didn’t feel as though they were meant to. 

Almost every night, Seven would stand in front of their mirror and stare at the body that was supposedly theirs. No one acknowledged them, but on the rare occasion that they were, the word ‘she’ came out of their family’s mouth and it did not feel as though it was the correct pronoun. 

As of the long hair that rested on their shoulders, every week Seven picked up scissors and thought about cutting it short. However, every time they didn’t. Number Seven’s only job was to be ‘just ordinary’ and if they felt anything of than that, then their one goal would be a failed one. 

When the six received their names, Vanya was filled with a joy they had never felt before. Vanya, it could be used as either a male or female name and it was perfect. The addition of their name added more confusion to their brain; why did it matter so much to Vanya that it was a unisex name? 

It took Vanya a year after Five left to come to the conclusion that he was a trans male. As of Five’s disappearance, they had no one to tell so he kept it to their self, letting the discomfort intensify whenever the word ‘she’ was played on someone’s vocal cords to address him. 

One day they could not deal with the longness of hair resting on their head, therefore they got his mother to cut it short. It took their siblings and father over two weeks to notice and one look in the mirror to finally see a person that looked like them. His father punished him privately in his office as of the subject. However, after many begs to keep it short, Reginald agreed that as long as he showed improvement in their violin, then it could remain short.

It was six months after Ben’s death that they realised that they did not feel like a man and definitely not like a woman. At midnight, the day after Diego left, Vanya left out of the front door and didn’t return until many years later. 

The first thing they did after arriving at his new apartment was book an appointment with a gender therapist. As of the appointment being privately booked, the waiting list was not as long as expected to be and, after many sessions talking with Dr Wilson, realised that he was not part of the gender binary.

When he was twenty, they started testosterone gel and a year after that, they got top surgery. For the first time in their life, the person in the mirror was them.


End file.
